Steven Isserlis and Olli Mustonen play Shostakovich’s Cello Sonata in D Minor - deemed as ‘the most popular cello sonata of the twentieth century’ - alongside two other Russian masterpieces, from pre-revolutionary Prokofiev to Kabalevsky in the Khrushchev era.

‘Isserlis and Mustonen make a strong case for [the Kabalevsky Sonata] in a performance of grand gestures that proves a real roller coaster ride. Isserlis’s intensity and Mustonen’s pianistic weight suit the piece wonderfully well, and the tolling opening chords sound at once solemn and threatening as Isserlis traces the sorrowing first subject over them. The first climax has an almost shocking ferocity that seems to haunt the meandering scherzo-cum-waltz that eventually follows, and the finale is both hair-raising in its manic energy and thrilling as a display of technical prowess … Isserlis and Mustonen play [the Rondo in memory of Prokofiev] with the combination of lyricism and drama that characterises the rest of the disc. Very fine’ - Gramophone